AbsolutLee

“Man, the living creature, the creating individual, is always more important than any established style or system.” Bruce Lee

“Life itself is your teacher, and you are in a state of constant learning.” Bruce Lee (Striking Thoughts – 2000)

Bruce Lee (27 November, 1940 – 20 July, 1973) was a Chinese American martial artist and actor who is widely regarded as the most influential martial artist of the 20th century.

Lee was born in Chinatown, San Francisco on 27 November 1940 to parents from Hong Kong and was raised in Kowloon with his family until his late teens. He was introduced to the film industry by his father and appeared in several films as a child actor. Lee moved to the United States at the age of 18 to receive his higher education, and it was during this time that he began teaching martial arts. His Hong Kong and Hollywood-produced films elevated the traditional Hong Kong martial arts film to a new level of popularity and acclaim, sparking a surge of interest in Chinese martial arts in the West in the 1970s. The direction and tone of his films changed and influenced martial arts and martial arts films in Hong Kong and the rest of the world.

“The slender, swift Bruce Lee was the Fred Astaire of martial arts, and many of the fights that could be merely brutal come across as lightning-fast choreography.” – Pauline Kael reviewing Enter the Dragon, from 5001 Nights at the Movies (1982)

“Don’t get set into one form, adapt it and build your own, and let it grow, be like water. Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless — like water. Now you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup; You put water into a bottle it becomes the bottle; You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.” Lee

“Don’t think, feel….it is like a finger pointing a way to the moon. Don’t concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory!” -Lee: Enter the Dragon (1973);

“Don’t fear failure. — Not failure, but low aim, is the crime. In great attempts it is glorious even to fail.”B.Lee – Striking Thoughts (2000)

“Time means a lot to me because, you see, I, too, am also a learner and am often lost in the joy of forever developing and simplifying. If you love life, don’t waste time, for time is what life is made up of.” B. Lee – Striking Thoughts (2000)

He is noted for his roles in five feature-length films: Lo Wei’s The Big Boss (1971) and Fist of Fury (1972); Way of the Dragon (1972), directed and written by Lee; Warner Brothers’ Enter the Dragon (1973) and The Game of Death (1978), both directed by Robert Clouse

“When I was having dinner with Chuck Norris I did ask him: “If you and Bruce would be in a real fight to death, who would win?”, and he said without thinking: “Bruce of course. Nobody can beat him.” – John Benn, in audio commentary on DVD of “The Way of the Dragon”

“Of course you’re there. Death is always there. So why was I afraid? Your leap is swift. Your claws are sharp and merciful. What can you take from me which is not already yours? . . . Everything I have done until now has been fruitless. It has led to nothing. There was no other path except that it led to nothing — and before me now there is only one real fact — Death. The truth I have been seeking — this truth is Death. Yet Death is also a seeker. Forever seeking me. So — we have met at last. And I am prepared. I am at peace. Because I will conquer death with death.” B.Lee – spoken by Cord, the protagonist of the unproduced film “The Silent Flute”

The company was formed in 1889 by Henry David Lee as the Lee Mercantile Company at Salina, Kansas producing dungarees and jackets.